Bedtime Stories
by LavenderAndTime
Summary: *REPOSTED* The night after Rory's erasure from the universe, an exhausted Amy Pond retires to bed, and the Eleventh Doctor suddenly finds himself troubled by the memories of his long past. But sometimes, what one needs isn't someone to listen- just someone to talk to. One-shot.


**This is a short one-shot I'm reposting (with edits) from my old account, which I lost access to. Enjoy!**

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_Bedtime Stories_

The Doctor paced up and down the endless hallways of his TARDIS. It had been a long day, and a very tired Amy had just commuted to bed a few minutes earlier, insisting that she needed to get some sleep. Now, without her light-hearted voice cheering up the place, the only sound stirring in the massive complex was the quiet hum of the time rotor, which echoed like a slight whisper through the corridors.

Thinking to himself, the Time Lord reflected on the happenings of the past few hours, recounting to himself the return of the Silurians, the loss of Rory, and Amy's forgetting of him. Watching all memory of her Rory fading from her very eyes was heartbreaking for the Doctor to witness, almost as heartbreaking as him having to wipe all remembrance of himself from Donna Noble, the most important woman in the universe. But that incident was years ago. Though it still sometimes lingered in his head, coming to surface at the most inopportune moments, he had for the most part chosen to regard it as simply a "bad day", much like he did the Time War.

The lonely man continued aimlessly through the TARDIS, not having any real destination, but eventually stopping at Amy's bedroom door. It was slightly ajar, he noticed. Though the Doctor usually wouldn't dare peek into a friend's room like that, as an invasion of privacy, he could still see a small source of light coming from inside. He could clearly see Amy lying flopped on top of the covers of her bed, as if she had collapsed there exhaustedly, falling fast asleep the minute her head hit the soft comforter. He felt a twang of pity in his hearts for her, as her current position didn't look very comfortable at any stretch of the imagination. After a few minuscule seconds of deliberation, the Doctor silently entered her room.

On the TARDIS, the bedroom of a companion was designed to circulate around their current feelings, wishes, and dreams. It could change at any moment, and the more the TARDIS knew about them, the more it became personalized. With this, the Doctor, though he had never stepped foot into Amy's special room before, could nonetheless tell what dreams were mulling around in her head at that particular moment. Her room was almost completely dark, a searing panorama of space, galaxies, nebulas, and planets from afar slowly orbiting the walls around the small bed. The actual bed laid in a corner, just a twin-sized, with a tall back to it, the whole structure that deep, perfect shade of black. Comets flew by every once and a while on the ceiling, and light from a million stars gave off a dim glow in the room, the light the Doctor had seen from outside. Besides the bed, the room was empty. There were no other pieces of furniture in here, which kind of surprised him a bit.

The Doctor bent down, and gently moved Amy's body so that she was completely in her bed. He tucked her in, pulling the covers to her chin. During that whole time, Amy never so much as stirred. He took a seat on the edge of her bed, moving a stray stand of ginger hair out of her face.

"Amelia Pond..." the Doctor uttered quietly, giving a hint of a smile down at his friend. "You waited for me your whole childhood, yet you've never, in those 14 long years, given up on me... You've never given up on me, even today. I'll tell you one thing, I don't deserve that kind of trust, you know? Rule one: the Doctor lies. That's always been the case... Even from the very beginning..." He sighed, old memories suddenly pounding against his head, wanting to come out, wanting to be lived, wanting to be breathed. He never really wanted to talk about back then, but in a way he needed to. His mind was troubled, and he needed someone to talk to. Not necessarily one to listen, just someone to talk to. That's sometimes all one really needs. So the Doctor got into a comfortable position sitting on the edge of the bed, and began to tell the sleeping Amy a story. He started from the very beginning...

"Once, oh... Many years ago... There was a boy, who lived on a distant planet. Gallifrey, its name was. I think I've mentioned it before." The Doctor paused, sadness welling up inside him at the mention of his home world. Nevertheless, he continued.

"But this young boy was different from all the others. This boy dreamed, Amy. He dreamed of seeing the stars, up close and personal. This dream stayed with him his whole life on Gallifrey... He never forgot." The Doctor fidgeted on the edge, wringing his hands. Memories of an innocent childhood swept through his mind like a wildfire. _Were had it all gone wrong,_ he thought. _Where had it all gone awry?_

"This boy ended up marrying, having a family. Children, and grandchildren, and even great-grandchildren. During this time, though... the leadership, on Gallifrey... it began to be corrupt. So the boy planned an escape, stealing an obsolete type 40 TARDIS, and running away, with one of his granddaughters. He was... admittedly a grumpety old thing," the Doctor admitted sheepishly. "Wanted to feel important. He was SO young, yet so old. They ended up exiling on Earth, in London. His granddaughter, Susan, her name was, well... she went to school there for a few months, returning home each night to that TARDIS, which had landed in a small junkyard. 76 Totter's Lane... That's where it all began..."

_That was also where the TARDIS first took form as a police public call box, its chameleon circuit malfunctioning soon afterwards,_ the Doctor though quietly to himself. Throughout all those years he had tried to fix it, and he actually succeeded once, but it almost immediately faulted back to police box. He never really tried to fix it again. The Time Lord had, over all those years, grown to love the TARDIS as it was. He closed his eyes, both telling his story to the silent Amy and living it, in his memories.

"That's when he started to run," he continued, telling Amy the story, "and, I can tell you... he never stopped. He's still running, even to this day, after hundreds of years, and no matter what happens, he will continue, and I know this. Because that boy is me. That was my story, my life."

The Doctor took a melancholy breath, leaning against the bedpost. There was a distant look in his eyes. "But that boy is alone now... Gallifrey is gone, and with it, my people. Everyone." He closed his eyes, trying not to think about it... Trying not to think about the Last Great Time War, the war that shattered it all. The Moment.

Suddenly the Doctor snapped back to attention, and opened his eyes again. It had been two lives since the war, but that did not mean it didn't still haunt his nightmares. He sighed deeply, and began to continue telling his story to the sleeping Amy lying silently under the covers.

"Things happen, though, and you have to learn to move on. For a while, I remember refusing to travel with anyone at all, afraid of losing them. But it got boring after a while, and... I started talking to myself. Then I found you... The Girl Who Waited. And you waited, and waited, and you waited for fourteen whole years, and now you're here! My Amelia Pond... here at last!"

The Doctor smiled down at the sleeping form below him. "I never have told you how much I love you being here, every day. Because you are magnificent, and don't you ever let anyone tell you different, you hear? You saved the star whale, you stopped the bomb the Daleks made, you walked through a field of Angels with your eyes shut, the whole way! So remember this, Amy, and thank you for everything. I don't feel alone anymore, thanks to you."

He raised himself from his sitting position on the bed, and slowly crept towards the door, being careful not to make a sound. He silently stepped through the doorway, turning around to look at her one last time before he left. "Goodnight, Amelia..." he whispered, "Sleep well!" He then slowly and quietly shut the door.

And in the black bed that she lay content in, a small smile crossed Amy's face, as she opened her eyes and looked up at the stars.


End file.
